I know everyone talks about HP, but I need Torque on my 4.7L. I use it for hauling/trailering only, about 5000-7000 lbs. Should have bought the Hemi, I know, but not much I can do about it now short of selling my truck and buying a new one. I just looked at the HP and thought "wow its more than my old Magnum, why waste the money on the hemi?", not realizing the torque took a hit. Hindsight is 20/20, right?

Should I just work on building HP and presume torque will come along with it? (Intake, Exhaust, Tuner, etc) or are there some modifications that will go further in the torque department?

Thanks!

 

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/in...9191151AA7nJ68

Basic bolt ons (intake, exhaust, programmer) they all can help.

https://dodgeforum.com/forum/3rd-gen...d-how-tos-133/
Reading other experiences can help you decide what you will do to your truck.

 

At this point, especially if you tow very often, the best improvement would be gearing. Not knowing if you are 4X4, or what type of driving wether 2 or 4 lane, or in town etc I can't really make a definite recommendation but I would look at 4.10s or maybe even 4.56s depending on what gears you have and how much help you need. JMO.

 

I am 4x4. 3.55 axle. Mostly highway, 75% 4 lane, 20% 2 lane, 5% in town.

When driving right around where I reside its no problem because its flat, but the minute I hit the hills it makes it, but I hear it crying. I lock it into 4th gear and sometimes it drops to 3rd.

I mean its "doable", but I'd be willing to spend some money to make it maintain speed, accelerate when necessary, maybe even headed up hills, maybe even get a tiny bit of passing power when needed on the 2 laners and drive like it can handle the load I know it can. Most importantly, I don't want to feel like I sold a 10 year old car, spent a lot of money, and bought a car that can't do what the 10 year old car did as well as the 10 year old car could do.

I think a tuner can help a lot because it can shift the shift points, so it won't wait until it drops to 62 mph (when cruise is at 70) to downshift... But exhaust, intake, etc. will go on too. I have a max budget of about 2500, but gears may not be a bad place to go. Gas mileage will take a hit, but immediate torque impact will be clear and helpful.

I need to do some research to see what it takes to get the 4.10 in there.

 

Do you use the tow/haul mode when towing? If so that should already have your shift point RPMs increased. I'm not sure about the 4.7 tuners but someone will jump in that is. By being 4X4 the gear swap is pricey but if you plan to keep the truck and tow I would probably shop around. Try some local transmission/differential shops they might surprise you. Just be sure they are reliable and will warranty their work.

 

HP is just a measurement, your engine doesn't and can't produce "hp" since it's a measure of how much work your engine is doing over time.. any engine produces torque, what you do is either increase the torque your engine makes, or you increase the RPM that it can operate at to increase it's power potential.

 

I use tow/haul mode even when I'm NOT towing. I spoke about that in a thread on here about a year ago. With tow/haul mode off and NOT towing, the drive down south to Myrtle Beach nets about 17 mpg. With tow mode off, It didnt do the crazy every 30 seconds downshift- thing through the mountains and I no joke netted just over 19 mpg! It also drives a lot "cleaner" making for a more comfortable ride. If I'm getting better gas mileage locking out the torque converter and using the +1 gear, I didn't understand why they configured it the way they did.

 

Correct, but HP and Torque don't always correlate in the usable spectrum.

Case in point: The 98-02 5.9 Magnum has 245 HP and 335 lb-ft torque.
The 09+ 4.7L Powertech gets 310 HP but only 330 lb-ft torque.

In other words, it has "65 more horsepower", but 5 lb-ft less torque.

Since HP is just a "representative number", it does not always correlate to towing performance (or racing performance for that matter). It becomes possible to increase HP without increasing usable torque. My question was what ways can you maximize usable torque because all the discussions are related to "increasing HP".

The issue is that "HP" is related to where in the RPM curve the torque occurs (HP is calculated as (RPM*Torque)/5252).

Maybe I should specifically state that I'm looking to boost low-RPM torque numbers? I don't care if it gets its peak horsepower at 5500 RPM. I don't encounter 5500 RPM in a normal driving experience in a truck (although I might in racing my corvettes). Now while I'm going to take an aftermarket suppliers product charts with a grain of salt, if you look at the dyno sheets for Airaid on the 4.7L ram, it suggests a pretty solid boost to useable low end torque. http://www.azraceplace.com/dyno/300-232_dyno.jpg . In fact it is 29 lb-ft of torque, all usable at the low-end of the spectrum.

Compare that to the Flowmaster dyno sheet for an exhaust setup. While there looks to be a similar HP gain at high RPMs, there is not nearly a noticeable low-end torque improvement:
http://www.carid.com/images/flowmast...dyno-chart.jpg

This means that just choosing modifications based on "horsepower gain" does not directly correlate with increased low-end torque.

I still think its reasonable to ask and discuss what modifications directly correlate to increased torque (particularly low end torque) instead of discussing modifications specifically affecting peak Horsepower. While Peak HP may be what some guys want for bragging rights, when your trying to haul, low to midrange torque is what is important.

 

Check with http://www.airram.com/custompage.php?page=18 They are 4.7 people that can guide you down the path you are looking for.
The unfortunate side effect of many power improvers is that they move the powerband up in higher rpms which is not always ideal for a heavy truck.

 

easy solution to that problem gearing.. get lower gearing since the 4.7 engine, to make that extra "power" is spinning faster, its' better to make high rpm hp than low rpm torque, since you can always change your gearing to make the extra torque were it matters, at the ground.